Monroe County dive team searches for missing dad
7/4/2013MONROE - The dive team from the Monroe County sheriff's department is searching Lake Erie in the Estral Beach area this morning for the father of an 8-year-old boy who jumped into Lake Erie Wednesday night during a fireworks exhibition.
Deputies said after the father, 36, whose name has not been released, never surfaced, but the boy was rescued by a nearby boater who observed the incident. The youngster was wearing a life jacket.
Witnesses told authorities that the father became disabled swimming toward the boy and disappeared from the surface.
A spokesman for the Coast Guard's Detroit office said the 36-year-old dad was watching a fireworks show with his wife, 28, and a son, 3, from their boat.
The boy jumped off the boat and the Coast Guard said his father jumped in after him, but the dad never resurfaced. The Toledo Coast Guard detachment was expected to join the search effort along with a Coast Guard helicopter.